Boy George sings heartbreaking Irish rebel song after discovering ancestor executed by British

Singer Boy Geroge has discovered more about his Irish family. Photo by Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images for AFI

Boy George has described his Irish family’s sad history as “ a great Irish song ... a lament.”

Born George Alan O’Dowd to Irish parents in London, Culture Club singer Boy George was always aware of his Irish roots but his family’s heartbreaking tale, as shown in his episode of “Who Do You Think You Are?” was sadder than he ever could have imagined.

Not every day you hear ‘Kevin Barry’ sung on the BBC.Really interesting albeit very tragic insight into our history. Fair play to @BoyGeorge for holding it together! @WDYTYA_UK

Viewers were very taken with Boy George’s episode and especially his rendition of Irish rebel song Kevin Barry with folk group Lankum in the Gravediggers Pub after a visit to Glasnevin Cemetery. Having grown up singing the tune and believing himself to have been related in some way to the teenage rebel Barry, it materialized that, while he may not have shared this exact connection to Ireland’s history of rebellion, he did have a great-uncle who was also executed by the British for his role in a rising of arms.

Inspired by the leaders of the 1916 Easter Rising, George’s great-uncle Thomas Byrne joined the Irish Volunteers and was arrested, sentenced and hung for carrying out a military drill. His wife Annie Glynn was pregnant at the time of his arrest but the baby died at just one day old only four days before Byrne’s execution.

That has to be the saddest #whodoyouthinkyouare I've ever watched, but also v interesting. No-one from Boy George's family got a run of luck. No one. Interesting that his family are so steeped in Irish revolutionary history, including a state funeral, which is a conferred honour.

“I really hope he didn’t know,” George says in the episode, where he visits Kilmainham Gaol to see his ancestor’s cell and the place where he was put to death.

The heartbreaking tale reaches further to home, however, when the early years of Boy George’s own grandmother in Dublin are revealed, telling how she was brought into an industrial school aged 6 and spent the next decade living there away from her family.

The Boy George programme was powerful viewing. The barbarity of the British in response to Ireland's bid for freedom was very emotional to watch. We have work still to do to deliver the Ireland those hero's fought and died for.